They were walking off the beach, that much was clear. Hobie still had something to ask though and it was rather quiet. "Can I just ask one thing?"
"Go for it," Felix said.
Hobie stopped. Didn't look at him either. "What will you do with the Sheath?"
Felix looked up at the sky. It was blue and wonderful. "There's a lot of suffering in the world. Ideally, I want to—"
"Research it? Use it? On Gwen?"
Felix looked down. Their eyes met again. "You don't want that?"
"In all my years as Spider-Man, as a traveller, here and there and everywhere, I've learned something." Hobie had never looked so serious and grave. "There are no shortcuts. There is no magic miracle. And there is no cure of everything. Not without a cost."
"So what do you suggest I do? Gwen's condition won't get better without it."
"It might not ever get better," Hobie retorted. "And that's reality, man. That's the cost of being Spider-Man. She knew it when she signed up and asked for that Symbiote."
"Still. Still, Hobie, I don't want her to die. I don't want any of us to die. Just because it's difficult being Spider-Man doesn't mean there's only one solution." Felix stopped. "Do you really think the Sheath isn't a good idea?"
"Spider to spider? Destroy it. Send it to space." Hobie fully turned toward him. "This Sheath of Knull shit sounds bad, man. I won't stop you if you do use it. I know I've got no chance in a fight or in doing anything sneaky. But if you keep it, then…" He inhaled. "It's the kind of thing that just brings out trouble, man."
"Your Spider-Sense telling you that?" Felix joked.
"Experience. Honestly, if word gets around about this Earth's sudden development in medicine, there's a good chance Alchemaxx is going to send the Big Man."
"You don't think I can beat him?"
Hobie looked him up and down. He assessed with what appeared to be an objective lens. "I'd say…" His hand flattened and wobbled. "Sixty-forty in your favour. But that's just from when I saw him."
"What, has he fought giant kaiju too?"
"Yes," Hobie replied without missing a beat. "Don't want to go into a huge history lesson, but once megacorporations like Alchemaxx started taking over the country in the 2060s, there was a race toward super soldiers. That caused accidents and monsters. That also created people sent to dispose of them, who in turn became monsters. It was a whole ecosystem of evolution fuckery—and the Big Man sat at the top of the best hunters. He even killed the Hulk of our world in 2087. Everybody thought the Hulk was immortal. The worst of the experiments that they'd never be able to correct." Hobie snorted. "He proved everyone's theory wrong."
"Hm."
Hobie started walking again.
"Just food for thought. I know you got enough on your plate."
"It's fine." Felix followed after him. "I think…I already have my answer."
Hobie glanced over his shoulder. "Ha. You know, that's not something I hear from Spider-Man often. Having an answer…ha."
The golden sand gave way to gravel, then to smooth asphalt. Felix and Hobie strolled back through the parking lot. Felix's gaze drifted past the rows of cars, scanning the sea of white and gray, until he spotted it. Xina's cargo van. A generic, boxy white vehicle, indistinguishable from a dozen others.
Hobie didn't even glance at it. He walked right past, heading for a sleek black Audi parked a few spaces down. He popped the trunk. Felix's nose wrinkled. There were a billion things in there, with oil being the strongest smell of them. Hobie nonchalantly rummaged through the trunk.
"Ah, 'ere you are, mate."
The device looked like a damn toy. It had a stick to hold and a futuristic four-sectioned blue monitor. It was downright comical with its size too. A silly baby toy to whack on the floor.
"Call it the Web-Signature!" Hobie declared. "Cool, right?"
"A little," Felix admitted.
"Alright, let's take this to Xina now!" Hobie's grin widened, a spark of genuine excitement in his eyes. "I can't wait to see that chick!"
"Sure, just follow me."
Humming, Hobie stayed two steps behind him. Surprisingly, however, Hobie reached the van first. He went, "Ah-hah," when he saw which van they were heading toward and ran over and slid the door open.
Xina's back was turned to them. She was hunched over a small console. The hologram showed capsules, the same ones they saw at the second floor of that house. Looked like she was investigating.
"Felix, you're already back—?"
Xina looked over and her expression became overtaken by shock. Hobie grinned.
"Miss me?"
Hearing his voice snapped her jaw shut and her mind back to reality. Her emotions melted into something softer, her eyes widening, her lips parting. A surge of emotion—relief, fondness, maybe even a touch of old grief—flooded her face. She stood up quickly—
"Hobie!"
—and threw her arms around him in a tight fierce hug. Hobie chuckled, patting her back.
"Really missed me, eh?"
They pulled apart slightly, still close. Xina looked into his eyes, her own shimmering with unshed tears.
"You have no idea. Wow. You…haven't changed a bit."
"And you look…older." Hobie actually looked taken aback. "A lot older."
"I'm in my forties, thank you very much."
That seemed to shock Hobie into silence. Smiling, Xina took the time to look him up and down. But, well, down wasn't exactly a good idea. Her face burst into flames.
"H-Hobie! The hell!? Put some clothes on! Both of you! You knobheads!" she shrieked, jerking backward and slapping a hand over her eyes. "I can't believe you! Both of you! Just…just…put something on!"
Felix smirked. Hobie laughed, a full, hearty sound. "Right, right. Sorry, Xina. Forget you ain't into this thing."
Hobie had to retreat from the van to get his duffel bag in his car's trunk. He returned in a pair of simple gray shorts and a black t-shirt. Felix didn't have to do all that, staying inside and having Rash give him a pair of black pants and shirt.
Xina had composed herself as Hobie opened the door. "Am I welcome now?"
"Haah…yes."
Cackling, Hobie hopped in. The Web-Signature in his hand had Xina cocking her head.
"What's that?"
"This, my old friend, is how we find the Sheath of Knull!"
Xina smiled. "Figures. Always strumming with something, aren't you, Hobie?"
Hobie winked. "I do my best. Buuut I do need to borrow Marilyn. Need the data you collected on the Sheath, if you have any."
Xina nodded and literally pushed the floating table toward Hobie. A hologram of the capsule was already isolated and scanning. "Access granted. Sync your thing."
Hobie clicked a button on his device, and a thin blue cable extruded from its base. He plugged it into a port on the table. Lights flickered on both machines. A hologram keyboard appeared and Hobie licked his lips and got to work.
"See, the issue is now GPS," he muttered after five minutes. "Marilyn doesn't have a GPS map of this Earth. She's got Earth-2099's, but not this one's." He sighed and announced. "Marilyn, please hack into a satellite."
"AFFIRMATIVE. LOADING TIME: THIRTY MINUTES."
Hobie kicked up. "Meh. Fairs."
Felix didn't want to wait. He gestured at Hobie. "Keyboard."
He pushed him to the table with the hologram and keyboard. Felix typed rapidly. A parabolic antenna appeared at the sides of the van's windshield.
A moment passed, then text scrolled on Marilyn's main screen and the AI announced: "CONNECTION WITH AI HERBIE ESTABLISHED. SATELLITE FEED INITIALIZING."
Hobie's eyes widened. "Woah, woah, did I just hear that right? Herbie, the first AI!?"
"Mhm. Apparently, this whole time," Xina nudged her head at him, "Felix had him."
Hobie tilted his head. "No way. How the bloody hell did you get him? That's, like…on our Earth, that'd be worth billions!" The implication then set in. "Wait, do you know Reed Richards—"
"GLOBAL GEOGRAPHICAL DATABASE SYNCHRONIZED. SEARCH PARAMETERS ACCEPTED. SCANNING FOR SHEATH SIGNATURE."
The blue monitor on Hobie's device began to glow, sections lighting up one after another. A holographic map from the table was projected, showing the entire North American continent. Pulses of light swept across it like a sonar ping.
"The signature is unique. A mix of organic symbiote tissue, cosmic radiation, and Parker Particles," Hobie said. "So it shouldn't take too long."
The pulses converged, narrowing, focusing. The map zoomed in, shifting from continent to state, to city.
The light stabilized, pulsing steadily over a single point.
"LOCATION CONFIRMED."
The text displayed coordinates, then translated them into an area: Chelsea, New York City, New York.
Hobie let out a low whistle. "Well. There it is."
"Can't we get a specific address?" Xina asked.
"Just give it some time," Hobie said. "It'll narrow in as we go there."
"Chelsea, New York, huh?" So it was right under his nose. "Why would Harry hide it there? Hrm…"
Whatever the reason, the van was revving up and ready to leave.
***
Morning came quietly.
The old man woke before the sun had fully committed to rising. It was habit. The ceiling above him was cracked. He stared at it for a few seconds, unmoving, as if waiting for something to change.
Nothing did.
With a soft grunt, he pushed himself upright. His joints protested like any old person's would. It was a dull, familiar ache and he appreciated his feet touching the cold floor. It was a nice shock.
The apartment was small, not cramped, but not generous either. It was somewhere between being clean and dirty. He hardly vacuumed. Still, everything had its place, and everything stayed there.
He shuffled into the kitchen and he yawned. The routine began. He made himself tea, then two eggs, cracked cleanly and dropped into a pan that had seen better years. A slice of bread went into the toaster.
The old man carried his breakfast and sat. Steam curled upward from the mug of tea, briefly fogging his glasses when he leaned in. Halfway through his meal, he reached to the side and picked up the newspaper folded neatly on the table. He hadn't touched it yet. He always saved it for after the first few bites, like delaying something unpleasant.
MILITARY CONFIRMS CAPTURE OF VIGILANTE "SPIDER-WOMAN" IDENTIFIED AS GWEN STACY
His grip tightened. The fork in his other hand stilled halfway to his mouth. Below it, another headline:
MONSTER SLAIN: "THE HULK" DECLARED DEAD AFTER FINAL BATTLE
His appetite vanished without ceremony and his eyes moved back to Gwen's name.
"Gwen…"
After a long moment, he folded the newspaper back down, just enough to hide the headline from view. His gaze drifted across the room and to the front door. Beside it, mounted on a simple rack, hung a jacket.
A police officer's jacket.
The silence stretched.
His jaw shifted slightly, tightening, loosening, tightening again.
"Stop it, George."
He didn't stand.
He didn't reach for it.
He didn't move at all.
What would be the point? For him to yell again? To be deemed a monster again?
The world didn't care for people like him.
"George Stacy."
For people like George Stacy, father of Gwen Stacy.
The old man—George Stacy—shot to his feet, the chair scraping harshly against the floor as he spun around. "Who in the world—?"
There, in front of the open window was a figure clad entirely in black. The black seemed to drink in the light. Across the chest, a sharp red emblem spread like something alive.
"Y-you're…"
The former police captain shifted instinctively, years of training snapping into place despite everything. The figure raised a hand slightly.
"Apologies," Spider-Man said. "Didn't mean to startle you."
George didn't relax, not even a little.
His eyes scanned the room quickly, calculating distances, exits, anything he could use. But the man, he had heard the stories. He had seen the video footage. He had thrown a fucking kaiju into space.
George swallowed and eventually had to settle with eye contact.
"What do you want… Spider-Man?" George Stacy asked bravely. "Is this about my daughter?"
"Yes. And no."
George's eyes hardened.
"Yes and no? The hell's that supposed to mean?" His voice sharpened. "You stole her name and what? You're here to apologize to me?" He took a step forward, anger slipping through the cracks now. "You were in that battle. You couldn't stop them from capturing her." His jaw clenched. "You want to apologize. Is that it?"
"…I do, but…I'm not sure if that's what you need."
"...?"
"Your daughter, Gwen, she really is an amazing person."
It looked like the first time anyone had ever told him that. Maybe because it was. There were those that praised Gwen in passing. Those that insisted Gwen didn't kill Peter Parker or that she didn't deserve to be sent to prison.
There was always doubt, however. George couldn't help it, he was a police officer. And then there was another harsh reality; he had locked himself up and intentionally did not want to hear his daughter's heroics. He didn't want to be reminded.
Spider-Man forced him to hear it.
"She inspired me to be who I am. To be Spider-Man. She was a hero when no one else wanted to be. That took guts. And I know she learned that from you."
George stared at him and the red emblem. The colour and the shape, it was different. His red symbol was darker and longer than the white symbol Gwen wore. Yet the symbol was the same. The heroism reminded him of her.
"You know…I…I've been watching since you first appeared. Since the appearance of that first Symbiote. Since you saved Princess Ororo and all those important people. I was glad." His head tilted down to hide the small smile on his face. "The fact that someone was carrying on Gwen's legacy. I really was."
"I'm glad."
George fell into silence. "You said you're not here for Gwen. What are you here for then?"
"I'm here for the thing that will save her life. I'm here for the Sheath."
"...the what?"
The confusion on George's face couldn't have been faked. But there was no mistaking it: the Sheath was here. In this building.
That couldn't be a coincidence.